Last updated 10/17/22
When the obstacle in your way seems to have stopped you in your tracks,
it’s not a failure.
It’s part of what’s calling forth the necessary change
so you can move through, around, over, or under whatever is on your path to success.— Christian Sørensen
This quote applies to my relationship to public domain books,
Although I started narrating audiobooks in 2002, it wasn’t until ACX launched in 2011 that I really got a foothold in the industry. Prior to that point, the market didn’t exist for a narrator who lived in Atlanta. You either had to be in New York or LA; otherwise, producers didn’t want to talk to you. With ACX, all of the rest of us could have a voice in audiobooks, too.
I soon burned out doing ACX projects since most of them were royalty share books where the rights holder was not promoting the audiobook. (Shameless plug: If you’re interested, I explain how to pick good ACX titles in my webinar Put Yourself in the ACX Drivers Seat, available on my Shop page.)
At the same time, I wasn’t getting traction with publishers. I decided to start recording more public domain books.
Public domain (PD) books are those where the copyright has expired. They belong to all of us, and anybody can do anything they want to with a book that’s in the public domain.
Over time, I’ve kind of become what I think of as the Public Domain Whisperer™️. I regularly search Hathitrust.org for interesting PD books. I often find a book that I think would be a good one for another narrator to do, so I send the link and the suggestion to them.
I’ve been gratified by the enthusiastic and excited responses to my finds. One experienced and award-winning narrator told me I had set them on a new path, and they’ve won a number of awards for their PD productions!
This article will be my Public Domain Narration Headquarters. I’ll start with ten reasons why I love, love, LOVE recording and publishing public domain books. Plus, check out the resources list below as well as the comments, where I answer your questions!
10. You’ll find an abundance of books that are ready for you to do.
Right this minute, everything in the US published in 1926 and earlier is in the public domain. The copyrights have all expired.
Everything from 1927 to 1963 could be in the public domain, and the majority of them are. The copyrights had to be renewed during those years, and most people didn’t renew them. You must research a book’s copyright status to determine if the copyright was renewed. You’ll find info about research in the Resources section below.
Every year, new books come into the public domain!
On 1 January 2023, everything published in the United States in 1927 becomes public domain. What does that include? Well, the last of the Sherlock Holmes stories was published in 1927, so ALL of the Sherlock Holmes stories would be P.D. Other books from 1927 are the first three Hardy Boys mysteries, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and books by Willa Cather, Virginia Woolf and Mary Roberts Rinehart. These and many more books will be public domain on January 1st.
If a book was published in 1927, you can start recording it today and be ready to publish it on New Year’s Day. You may find the early bird gets the worm.
9. You have complete creative control and freedom.
You can change words. You can add or remove words. You can combine texts. In short, you can do anything you want to with a public domain book and are only limited by your creativity and imagination. I know people who have combined fairy tales or short stories (by theme or author) together to create a new compilation.
In a similar vein, one of my favorite projects of all time was one where I actually mashed up two public domain texts. Let me tell you the story to give you an idea of something you can do.
In 1889, Elizabeth Cochrane was a journalist for the NY World paper owned by Joseph Pulitzer. Her byline was Nellie Bly. As a publicity stunt for the paper, Nellie Bly challenged the feat set by fictional character Phileas Fogg to go around the world in 80 days. She was in New York and traveled east to London. She boarded a ship in mid-November, when the northern hemisphere was growing colder and losing daylight each day.
Meanwhile, Cosmopolitan, a rival magazine, didn’t want Nellie to get all the attention. So Cosmopolitan sent their reporter Elizabeth Bisland on a train that same day going west to San Francisco.
Nellie was trying to beat Phileas Fogg’s time, and Elizabeth wanted to beat Nellie! Nellie didn’t even know about Elizabeth’s trip.
They each wrote stories for their publication during their trips and later compiled their adventures in a book. Nellie’s book was published in 1890, and Elizabeth’s book appeared in 1891.
I mashed up their texts and put both women on the same timeline, which was so thrilling and exciting that I could barely stop to eat or sleep! I hired Melissa Reizian Frank to do a dual narration with me. In 2015, I published Bly vs Bisland: Beating Phileas Fogg in a Race Around the World in conjunction with the 125th anniversary of the end of the race. I love that whole project and still get chills thinking about it!
8. Public domain books don’t have any kind of external production deadlines.
If an idea sparks for you but you can’t work on it now, it will still be available when you have time for it. Be aware, though, why ideas love speed. Also, as another side note to that article, the Bly vs Bisland mash-up was an idea that woke me up!
Last year, another mash-up idea came to me. I’m slowly developing it in between narrating for publishers and continuing my self-publishing with ready-made PD books, as well as my continuous work on NarratorsRoadmap.com. A good PD book perfectly fills holes in my schedule!
7. Public domain books are usually extremely well edited, and they have very few typos.
I particularly appreciated this aspect after narrating some contemporary manuscripts that weren’t quite up to that standard.
6. With PD books, I can record in genres that I love or in those where I’d like to work, all a low pressure setting.
Nobody’s waiting on this recording or looking to see what I’m doing. I can try something new, which in turn gives me something else to share with people on social media and in my marketing.
I devour biographies for pleasure reading, so you can imagine my excitement to find Diane Disney Miller’s The Story of Walt Disney from 1957. The copyright was not renewed, and she later said she didn’t really write it. It’s Walt’s story as written by Pete Martin. It’s as close to Walt’s memoir as there ever was. I recorded it and was thrilled to publish it on the 110th anniversary of Walt Disney’s birthday.
5. When I’m self publishing, I’m always working and improving my narration skills.
Language styles change over time. I seem to pick PD books with very complex sentence structures. With every book I do, I look for ways to present the material naturally in a way that aids listener understanding.
As part of APAC this year, I was able to have a short meeting with a producer. Their first question was, “Tell me what you’ve been doing lately.” I replied that I had recently completed a true crime book and a couple of biographies. I didn’t distinguish that the true crime book was for a publisher and the 2 biographies were self-published public domain books. It all counts!
4. You can still record a PD book even if there are other audio editions of the book available.
The beauty of public domain texts is that they belong to all of us! If it’s a popular book like The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, you may discover other audio editions available, sometimes MANY other productions. Nothing can stop you from recording another one! Your interpretation is going to be different than anyone else, and you’re making art that you’re proud of.
Current events can generate interest in an audiobook, for instance the news story behind this vague tweet where I went looking for a PD book. In 1915, explorer Ernest Shackleton sailed his ship Endurance to Antarctica. It got stuck in the ice and sunk. Over a century later, the ship was discovered. The History Channel showed a fascinating documentary about it in March.
My search for related books revealed Shackleton wrote about it in South. Several audio versions of it had been done, but I would happily record that book if I were a British man. He wrote another book about a different exploration that’s not on Audible. I also found a fabulous biography about him that’s not in audio.
An upcoming movie tie-in could be a great reason to publish a new edition of a book! The movie company’s marketing machine could put the wind in your sails and help your audiobook gain visibility.
3. I can submit my work for review.
AudioFile Magazine reviewed one of my public domain books and has reviewed many from other narrators.
2. I can submit my work for awards.
I entered So Big by Edna Ferber in the Independent Audiobook Awards and was thrilled when it became a finalist in the Classics category.
1. I keep all of the royalties.
I have to tell you, passive income from public domain audiobooks every month is the gift that keeps on giving!
Like a royalty share book, you’re not guaranteed a book will sell, much less be a hit. It may take a while for it to earn out. It may never earn out. It’s always a risk.
But one PD book that does really well can make up for all the ones that aren’t selling as well! The more public domain books I record and publish, the more I want to do, and the more excited I am about my work.
Other resources on this topic:
As I continue to create content related to public domain books, I’ll update the list below.
Starting Point
- I include the most detail about public domain books in my Create Your Own Path video course, which is available to all paid members of NarratorsRoadmap.com.
- I talk about finding sources of books or even inspiration for your search. I also discuss how to research copyrights to determine whether the book is in the public domain, explain publishing considerations and distributor options, and include a long list of relevant resources not found here. For instance, I’ve curated collections of books on Hathitrust.org that narrators might choose to perform in the categories of: 1925 publications, 1926 publications, baseball, biographies/memoirs, diaries and letters, fiction, history and crime, Theodore Roosevelt, and Will Rogers. I also link to other sites with PD books.
- Members also can access my Audiobook Distributors Comparison Chart. I compare 6 distributors across 22 points so you can decide the best distributor(s) for your audiobook.
- As a special enticement to join, you’ll find a discount on my Shop page in the “Rent My Brain” section.
- I participated in this June 2022 Clubhouse chat about PD books.
- I’ve long advocated creating your own work. In addition to my 10 points above in this article, you might read my articles Reasons to Create Your Own Stuff part 1 and part 2. The profound Eckhart Tolle quote that I highlighted in part 2 has proven true for me.
- Since public domain books have much in common with royalty share books, the 5 reasons I listed in this article to do royalty share books apply to public domain books. When I wrote I’d do a royalty share over a public domain title, I wasn’t commercially publishing PD books. Now, I’d publish a PD book before I’d narrate and produce an RS book!
- I wrote this article to help narrators understand some copyright basics.
- These 2 articles are overflowing with links you’ll use to research rights holders and copyright dates:
Amazon Edition
- If you distribute your audiobook through ACX or Findaway, which uses ACX to distribute to Audible, you must start the process with an Amazon edition. Keep in mind that ACX is owned by Audible, which is owned by Amazon; as a result, everything in ACX is part of the Amazon ecosystem. This requirement for an Amazon edition is ONLY true of ACX and Findaway. Other distributors do not have this stipulation. My Audiobook Distributors Comparison Chart for members of NarratorsRoadmap.com has much more info about distributors’ requirements and offerings.
- This article describes what I did to publish a Kindle edition. Be sure to read all of the extensive comments to get the workaround and more tips!
Cover Art and/or Supplemental PDF of Images
- I detailed my experiences in finding and selecting art for the Kindle version of Fanny Herself: A Passionate Instinct in this article. At the time, I had change the title to differentiate it per Kindle Publishing rules. If I were publishing it today, I’d leave the original title as is so that it would get displayed with the other editions on Amazon.
- This article examines whether you can legally re-use the images in a public domain book for your cover art or supplemental PDF.
- When using art depicting a real person, you not only have to research the copyright for the image but also whether you would violate their Right of Publicity as detailed in this article.
- You can use public domain art for your cover. My article Tour of Sites with Public Domain Art links to a bunch of repositories with comments about the images available in each.
- This site shows the most popular font by year. I love using a font that is authentic to the period of the book!
Promo Videos
- You might find inspiring ideas in my articles Creating promo videos with public domain components part 1 and part 2.
Marketing
- Since you’d be publishing your audiobook, you’d also be in charge of marketing and promoting it. You’ll find an abundance of ideas and tactics on my Audiobook Marketing Cheat Sheet.
Got a question for Karen to answer on the blog? Send her an email or enter a comment below. She prefers to answer publicly so that more than one person benefits from the answer. Due to the volume of requests that she receives, Karen may not respond personally to your message. Also, the info you seek may already be in her blog archives.
©1999-2022 by Karen Commins
Click here to subscribe to Karen's blog and/or newsletter.
Reposting and paraphrasing a question I received in email —
I love a certain author’s work. From what I can tell, their work is in the public domain. I found a collection of their short stories on Kindle. It says “annotated” and that it was republished. Does that mean it’s no longer in the Public Domain?
As of today, anything published in the US before 1927 is PD.
The annotations in the Kindle collection of that author’s stories are copyrighted, but the underlying PD stories are not.
Some of those stories published from 1927 forward could still be under copyright. You’d have to research the publication dates for the story to know.
I’d suggest that you curate your own collection(s) of the author’s stories, perhaps around a theme.
Reposting and paraphrasing a question I received in email —
I’m a union actor. Do you have info about producing a PD project under a SAG/AFTRA contract?
Assuming you’re planning to be the solo narrator, you would upload the completed PD book as a DIY project on the distributor(s) of your choice and receive all the royalties from it.
I’m non-union and therefore haven’t posted any info about SAG/AFTRA rules.
I do know that both ACX and Findaway can only report a project to the union if it has some PFH component, either royalty share plus PFH (ACX only) or straight PFH (both):
ACX SAG/AFTRA eligibility rules
Findaway Voices SAG/AFTRA eligibility rules Union talent are excluded from the Voices Share deals per this page.
It’s my understanding you could do as many non-union (usually royalty share, but PD books would also fall here) audiobooks that you want. Non-union audiobooks wouldn’t count toward your health and pension plans but also wouldn’t get you in hot water with the union.
Definitely ask your reps how to proceed!
I’d really appreciate it if you would let me know what they say so I can learn, too. 🙂
Reposting and paraphrasing a question I received in email —
I’ve done some research on this book, and I think what I’ve learned is that some versions are in the public domain and others are not.
One text has copyright dates of 1904 and 1916.
The Stanford Renewal Database shows one published in 1961 and renewed in 1989. It includes this line:
“Limitation of Claim; New Matter: NM: cover & artwork throughout.”
However, a different entry in the Stanford Renewal Database was published in 1957 and renewed in 1985. It includes the line:
“Limitation of Claim; New Matter: NM: ill.”
Project Gutenberg has a copy, and the book has been recorded on Librivox.
Can you explain the difference in these books? Which one(s) could I record?
The book was first published in 1904, so the basic book is in the PD. Any edition published in 1926 or earlier is also PD, so the edition published in 1916 is also PD.
Publishers of editions from 1927 forward can only copyright new matter(NM) , which could be an intro, bibliography, etc., and/or artwork. However, that copyright does NOT extend to the underlying work of the original book.
For instance, the one that was published in 1961 has this line in the renewal:
Limitation of Claim; New Matter: NM: cover & artwork throughout
The original story is still copyright-free. The publisher could copyright their edition, but their copyright only applies to the cover and interior artwork that they created. Since they timely renewed their copyright before the end of the 28th year, they still hold the copyright for their material.
The same is true for the edition published in 1957 and renewed in 1985. The original story is still public domain, and that publisher still holds copyright on their art.
If I planned to record this book, I would read from an edition published before 1927. That way, you can feel assured that you are reading the original text.
Reposting and paraphrasing a question I received in email —
Should a newcomer do a public domain book as their first book?
Narrating a public domain book is not the best choice as a first book. In fact, assuming you want to commercially publish the PD audiobook you’d create, I suggest that you save PD work until you’re at an intermediate level of narration. That means you’re comfortable with your DAW and the entire recording process, and you understand how to get your recordings edited, ideally through outsourcing that task.
Public domain books are much more complicated than completing an RS project on ACX. As the publisher, you must first research and verify the copyright status, and then you have to determine which distributor(s) will publish your audiobook. You’re also responsible for creating the cover art and doing all marketing and promotion of the title.
Instead, I recommend all newcomers gain experience by volunteering to read for the blind with their state reading service and/or Learning Ally. State reading services can be found at this link.
I no longer advise people to volunteer on LibriVox because someone else may decide to sell your recordings. Since all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain, you would have no say or recourse about your work being sold.
Reposting and paraphrasing a question I received in email —
I don’t want to become a professional narrator. I just want to make some extra money from my narrations of public domain books. Is that possible?
It’s certainly possible to make extra income from PD audiobooks. It’s definitely not an enterprise where you could expect to get rich quick. If I wanted to make some extra money, I would do the exercise described in this article.
Audiobook listeners demand a high quality of both performance and production in return for their money. If the audiobook doesn’t sound good for any reason, the customer is likely to return it. Once that happens, the distributor claws back the royalties paid out.
Even if you don’t want to be a pro narrator, you’ll still be competing with them and therefore need some experience before diving in. Refer to the comment above about getting experience by recording for the blind. I’d also suggest that you follow the “First Steps” listed in the Connections area on the NarratorsRoadmap.com home page.
Once you publish your audiobook, you would be responsible for marketing it. Without visibility, you can’t expect much in the way of sales. If you’re doing a public domain book where audio copies already exist, how will you distinguish and promote your version? You’ll find some great ideas and tactics in my Audiobook Marketing Cheat Sheet.
Finally, be aware that some distributors pay monthly, while others pay quarterly. Some won’t pay until a threshold is reached. If money is needed immediately, with all respect I would advise you to look for a service-industry job.
Hi Karen. I’ve contacted you before, but I have abandoned ACX and am doing PD exclusively until I’m “discovered” by publishers. ha ha. Anyway, my rom-com is coming out via Spoken Realms at the end of this month, and I’m working on an English mystery to improve my accents. So, the point of this message is that I noted you like Hathi Trust. I went there, and I think it’s pretty tough to filter out the articles, and other scholastic work to just find novels. Any suggestions? So far, I’ve been exploring using Gutenberg. Also, you didn’t say anything about Spoken Realms.
Hi, Jim! Thanks for the note, and congrats on the PD books you’ve already done!
I’ll answer your questions in reverse order.
I didn’t mention Spoken Realms because I didn’t want to write about the pros and cons of different distributors. I limited my discussion of distributors in this article to ACX’s requirement of a Kindle edition because I linked to previous articles I’ve written about creating one.
Also, I’m developing a comparison chart of audiobook distributors that I will provide to members of NarratorsRoadmap.com. I’ll update the info in this article’s Resources when it’s ready.
As for searching HathiTrust.org, I definitely can appreciate your comments about the plethora of outdated governmental and academic documents in their archive!
You can click the link for Advanced Catalog Search and then filter the fields for author, title, etc. I also change the Publication Date to “before 1964” or “between 1927 and 1964”.
If you check the box for “Full view only”, you’ll see those publications that HathiTrust believes are in the PD. You can choose the language and an Original Format of “book” to narrow the results.
Your search results probably will still include numerous documents that are useless for our publishing empires, but at least you’ll see less of it! 🙂
I hope this info helps. Best wishes for your success!
Karen
I should mention that you need an account from one of HathiTrust’s institutional partners in order to download many of the books from this incredible digital repository.
Check to see if your college is on the list of members at HathiTrust.org. If you are no longer a college student, contact your alumni association to learn if it offers a login to your school.
Once you have login credentials from a member university, you can sign on to HathiTrust.org with full privileges including downloads of entire texts.
the UNION rules for AudioBook Narrating is vague and almost non-existent. Most Narrators, like myself, pay through a Paymaster service into our Sag-Aftra H & P. If I earned $1000 on Royalty Share Plus then I run it through the paymaster and I get less money myself, but I am paying into my system and that is what I need to do. there are several paymaster companies.
Hi, Stephen. Thanks for the note.
I’m non-union, so I don’t have much info or offer advice about union projects. However, I do know many union narrators who have produced their own projects from public domain books. I’m sure the union reps would be happy to give you guidance.
Karen
Reposting and paraphrasing a question I received in email —
If song lyrics are included in a public domain book, does that mean the song is also in the public domain? I’d love to sing the song in my recording.
You can’t assume that the song is public domain. You’d have to look up the song publication date. If it was before 1927, then it’s in the public domain.
If it looks like it’s still copyrighted, you could put it through the Fair Use test and decide if you want to sing it on that basis. This handy checklist goes through that test.
I sang some PD songs in JAILED FOR FREEDOM and found it fun (though I’m not the best singer!). Doing so brought me closer to the brave suffragettes.
In that same book, I used part of a copyrighted recording in my credits.
You’ve heard the saying, “Integrity is what you do when no one is watching.” I always try to find the rights holder and attempt to license my usage. However, even copious research may yield no results. Some works seem to be orphaned, while ownership of others have been swallowed in a labyrinth of corporate mergers.
My copyrighted recording from 1951 fell into the second category. I requested usage from Universal Music Group but received no response.
I felt my usage could pass the Fair Use test **IF I were ever questioned**.
As a non-attorney, I’d say the whole usage question is one of risk assessment. What is the chance the RH:
A) will KNOW you used their copyrighted material
B) will CARE you used their copyrighted material
C) would be willing to go after you for using their copyrighted material
If all those things are true, the RH’s first step would be to send a “Cease and Desist” letter. If I received one, I’d reply with my Fair Use analysis.
If that didn’t resolve the dispute, I would attempt to negotiate a license for my usage.
In my worst case scenario of a potential lawsuit, it would be easy enough to remove the copyrighted material and upload an updated file for an audiobook already on sale.
Posting a question I received in email —
I saw your course about doing public domain books and found one I want to do. If I want to pair my audiobook with an existing Amazon edition, how do I find contact info for the RH of the Amazon book?
In module 3 of the Create Your Own Path course on NarratorsRoadmap.com, I talk about distributors. At 5:34, I show where the publisher’s name is listed on the Amazon page. The call-out bubble on the screen notes that you may find their contact info with the Amazon Look Inside feature.
If it’s not printed in the book sample, you’ll have to Google them.
You may also need to check Amazon for other listings of the same book as all the editions may not appear together on the same page.
You may spend some time Googling different publisher names to come up with the contact info for one.
If you still can’t find contact info, or if no one responds to your message, you can always distribute your audiobook through another provider that doesn’t go through ACX to publish to Audible. Look at my Audiobook Distributor Comparison Chart for details.